


Bricks Without Clay

by parkadescandal



Series: soriku week [3]
Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Computer Programming, Day 6, First Time, M/M, Parallels, SoRiku Week 2019, databoys, kingdom hearts gay:coded, sora CAN computer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:07:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21773434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parkadescandal/pseuds/parkadescandal
Summary: Adventures in the Date Escape.
Relationships: Data-Riku | Jiminy's Journal/Data-Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Series: soriku week [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1564756
Comments: 8
Kudos: 73





	Bricks Without Clay

**Author's Note:**

> _"As to Holmes, I observed that he sat frequently for half an hour on end, with knitted brows and an abstracted air, but he swept the matter away with a wave of his hand when I mentioned it. 'Data! data! data!' he cried impatiently. 'I can’t make bricks without clay.'”_ [[x]](https://sherlock-holm.es/stories/pdf/a4/1-sided/copp.pdf)

The King bursts into the sitting room where Sora and Riku lay reclined challenging one another to beat the high score on their Gummiphone games.

“Fellas, we need your help!” he cries. “Sora and Riku are in trouble!”

Riku looks up, brow raised in amusement.

“That’s news to us, Your Majesty,” he says with just a nip of insubordination. It’s familiar enough by now that Mickey blazes on.

“I mean the _data_ Sora and Riku. Something’s gone wrong!”

“Back up, Your Highness,” Sora says, shooting up from where he supports himself by the back on Riku’s patient arm. He loses balance and has to stay upright by slamming one hand to the floor below. “Data?” he continues, bewildered.

“It’ll probably be easier just to show ya,” Mickey says, once again moving on—it must be serious if he doesn’t correct Sora, since he’s never anything but sincere about the title. Riku clocks it it too; they throw one another a sidelong glance and follow Mickey’s hurried scramble out the door.

The alarm bells do a fine job of throwing off the normal rhythm of the beeps and whirs in Ansem’s lab, where they all stand peering over at the message that freezes the computer.

> _A_
> 
> _No_
> 
> _Th_
> 
> _Er_

“Xehanort?” Riku asks.

“It appears likely,” Ansem says, a hand stroking the bristles of his beard. “The last command input was internal. Seven characters. Thirteen keystrokes.”

“It’s a real specific code,” Mickey jumps in. “Conditional, ‘cuz someone’s gotta go through a big ol’ chain before anything even happens to start it. It’s probably been there a real long time. I think our fellas were doing some spring cleaning in the system and found the thing that finally triggered it. It sure looks like trouble, though. Since they weren’t there when the program first got started up, I’m real worried the system will try and boot them out.”

“Boot them out?” Sora asks, brows furrowed.

“As invasions,” Ansem explains patiently. “They may be perceived as common viruses and be henceforth eradicated.”

“Like the MCP.” Sora unconsciously puts a hand to his throat with a pinched expression. Riku himself has memories less than fond concerning threats of being _derezzed_.

_“_ Similar, yes. Time is of the essence. There are a great many obstacles a program may face—the risk of being consumed by a firewall, perhaps, or of being permanently locked out of the plane.”

_“_ But… they’re _just_ programs, right?” Riku asks, dubious.

“Oh, programs, yes. But rather determined ones. They’ve endured many a trial of their own. It follows that you would be uniquely qualified to be of assistance.”

Sora lights up.

“Does that mean—“

He strides over, fist raised in threat to the keyboard, but Ansem places a firm hand on his shoulder to stall him.

“That… will not be necessary. Though you are correct. I reason it would be beneficial to have you enter the system yourselves. Although there are… less _destructive_ means.”

Ansem says this with a slight grimace. Sora blazes right past it.

“So, get in the game and take out the bad guys? Easy peasy. Right, Riku?”

“…Right.” Riku rests his chin on his knuckles and holds his elbow in his other hand to survey the scene. He’s not terribly convinced, but needs must. “Well.” He looks toward Ansem. “You’re the data master.”

“No beaches, I’m afraid,” he replies. The only break in stoicism he shows is the near imperceptible smile he gives as response, just wry enough that Riku eases by a degree.

“Alright, fellas,” Mickey pipes up with urgency. “You never know what could happen out there. You gotta—“

“Expect the unexpected, yeah, yeah.” Riku drops his arms by his sides. “Then what are we waiting for?”

Ansem performs a rapid-fire set of commands via keyboard and pulls a switch to activate a thin pulsating light that emits an audible static. Sora salutes, and whoops out a little battle cry before running directly into said unexpected, heedless of Riku’s choked protest after him.

Riku turns around mid-stride and looks around back at the odd pair of royals they leave behind.

“Been a little quiet around here lately,” he says, a twinge apologetic, still walking backwards. He gives a half-hearted shrug. “What’ll I do with him?”

As his shoulders hit the beam, he hears the low rumble of Ansem’s laugh.

When he gets his bearings it’s to find that he doesn’t have them at all—it’s pitch black, and the only thing he can discern is the difference between the solid surface beneath his feet and the yawning chasm of unknown everywhere else. The Grid this is not.

He’s building up a spell in his palm to shed some light on the situation when he hears a scuffling behind him, then a series of frustrated mutters. It doesn’t sound like any kind of criminal masterminding, but he’s not taking any chances; Riku stills, and listens. There’s some additional mumbling, then a sound like a _zap_ followed by a familiar yelp.

He squints.

_“…_ Sora?”

Suddenly to the right of him there’s an electric glow, and Riku realizes that the yawning chasm does in fact have a distinct end—here, at the transparent panel directly beside him. He hears a startled “ _Oh!”_ and the sound of a static pulse before the other side is illuminated entirely. Touching his hand to the other side of the panel is Sora, not a day older than the night they’d left the islands. The keyblade in his other hand sparks, and phases in and out of reality in a blur.

“Riku!” he shouts, eyes wide. “Man, am I glad to see you!” He peers around to see the right of him, shifts on the balls of his feet to look now at the left of him, then drags his gaze all the way up from the tip to toe of him. “ _All_ of you, _wow_ —you must be the original. What are you doing here?”

“I thought maybe you could tell me, pal,” Riku says, gesturing outward. “Heard you were in a bit of a bind, so they sent us in as backup.”

“Well, that’s great,” he says, rubbing at his hair, then extends the hand holding the glitching keyblade as if to unlock the panel separating them before withdrawing it immediately with a shout. “Because I could really use a hand.”

“Here I am.”

“Here you are! So listen up: we got swept out in some sort of bug zapping, but we didn’t see it coming, and as much as I try I can’t get out on my own. Something’s wrong. I should be able to punch in part of the restore code over here and then finish the pattern over _there_ ,” and here he gestures at the space beneath Riku’s feet, “but every time I try to go through, it zaps _me_ instead! And it _stings_!”

Riku holds down a smile at his tirade, watching his nose crinkle as he pouts. Not much changes. But he doesn’t want to find himself falling too fond of a bunch of little ones and zeroes frozen in the shape of someone whose life he hasn’t ruined yet. Regardless, Riku prefers the real deal, and the sobering reminder he gets every time he sees the little lines starting to form on his face when he smiles.

“I take it that’s where I come in?”

“Sure hoping. How’s your memory?”

“Don’t recall.”

The data Sora scoffs and rolls his eyes, shaking his head with a grin.

“Okay. Watch me—when I tap out a pattern here on the wall, you have to echo it there on the floor the other way around. Got it?”

“Think so. But where—“

He looks down to find that each time he shuffles he can see distinct lines that form like tiles below.

“Simple enough. Lay it on me, pal.”

The data Sora throws a thumbs up and methodically begins the sequence on his side. Riku frantically looks between that and the floor and sees the shadow of each part of the corresponding sequence inverted below. In spite of his height, each key is just wide enough out of his range that he’s going to have to forgo grace (and possibly good graces) to stumble his way across the answering pattern. He steels himself, and begins to hop.

The data Sora starts to laugh, and Riku looks up to find him still giggling when he’s done.

“Swear you told me a long time ago you didn’t dance,” he says. Each of the tiles they’d pressed pulse together twice in satisfaction, and that section goes dark again.

“That was the old me,” Riku says in as serious a voice as he can muster. A light begins to blink just out of range on the path ahead, signaling their next stop. “I’m full of surprises.”

“Wait’ll I tell you that,” he says with unrestrained glee.

“I don’t know if I’d believe me, pal.”

They laugh easily, carrying a rapport through this new sequence and the next one, working their way through countless patterns of increasing difficulty until something about the environment changes.

“Oh! It’s the other way around this time. It was bound to happen eventually; now _you_ get the easy job. Tell me. Is it too late to sign up for dancing lessons?”

Riku allows a huff of laughter. The data Sora probes the panel one more time and immediately draws back in shock.

“ _Yikes_ ,” he says through a hiss, shaking out his hand. “This has gotta be the last one. You may not have the easy part after all; you’re going to have to feed me the code so I can start the pattern from over here for you to copy.”

“Can’t be too hard.”

“Well… Listen. Don’t freak out, but if we get it wrong… I may get stuck here for good.”

Riku blinks about it.

“Do you trust me?” he says.

“Of course I trust you, stupid. You’re my best friend. No matter what, if anyone could get us out of here, it’s you.”

“I—“ Riku looks to find him staring square ahead with determination, and backs down. “I’ll do my best.”

“Don’t worry about me. I know you will, you’re not gonna lose. I meant it.”

“Meant what?”

“That everything you touch makes you stronger.”

Riku turns his head to the side with a little note of wonder.

“Then I won’t let you down, pal.”

They huddle together as close as they can while still physically separate while Riku translates each part of the sequence one by one. They check, and double check, and then look at one another with a stern nod returned between them. Riku holds his breath as across the way tiny Sora takes running leaps to fly across the keys in the right order.

When he catches himself from a wobbling near miss as he hits the last one and finally throws a grin his way by way of a signal, Riku takes his time to tap out the last answering code with steady hands. On the last depress, a little trill chimes out.

“It worked!” Riku looks to find him celebrating, throwing a fist up in triumph. “Just one more!”

The floor beneath him shows the echo one last time, and with joyous whoops and hollers he bounces and cartwheels his way across every last one in perfect rhythm.

The entire platform beneath them is illuminated, like the lights are snapping on in waves across an infinite plane, and the panel between them descends.

Riku laughs and strides over for a celebratory high five, but he doesn’t it make it two steps before a high pitched whistling noise blows in with a powerful gust, and he doubles over, covering his ears with a grunt and a grimace.

Without a warning the floor beneath begins to spin, fast enough to hurl them both off their balance. An instant more and there’s another dramatic shift—impossibly, the room turns upside down, and they float weightless for a moment before it dumps them into an infinite freefall.

Riku can’t see, but not because it’s dark—the light is blinding, and he flails around for purchase he know he won’t find. If he can’t he can’t find support, though, he can _be_ it, and he squints in search of his companion.

“Hey!” he shouts, reaching out a hand as close as he can manage.

“Riku!”

“I’m right here!”

But things go sideways; he hits a surface with a smack. There’s a schism—his side of the platform remains lit, but that empty blackness seeps in once more over the other. He scrambles over, hand extended, but before he can reach him he hears him shout, and sees his hand slip away into nothing.

“ _Sora!_ ”

There’s nothing there, not even a hole for him to jump after, though he can still hear the faded sound of his scream on the tail end. Riku tries to stand but can’t, and then he’s shot out of the oblivion himself without even the dignity of his own scream.

Riku lands back into the physical world with a fall swift and abrupt; he barely restrains an exhaled _whuff_. He breathes in, laying back to assess the situation from a more lateral position, and barely has time to take it in when all the scenery around him is eclipsed by his favorite welcoming committee.

“The King went back home to check up on things on his end.” Sora fails to stifle a smug grin, doubled over to look him in the eye as he stands over him. “How’d it go?”

“Could be worse.” Riku hefts himself up onto his elbows, feeling surprisingly un-battered, and takes the hand Sora extends to help him up. “But… I lost the pipsqueak.”

He aims for levity, but it falters in the air, sounding simply kind of sad. Sora looks at him with something like pity.

“Well. I’m glad you’re okay, at least.”

He chooses to leave the response stuck in his throat lodged right where it is.

“You okay?”

“Oh, just peachy.” Sora shields one side of his face with his hand and continues in a stage whisper. “If it’s any consolation, you’re just as much as a jerk as ever.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” comes a dry voice from somewhere in the direction of the console, and it takes Riku a moment to register that it’s his own. Coming face to face with another doppelgänger wasn’t as easy as he’d expect after getting this much experience, though he thinks he’s grateful he’s still got the capacity to be surprised.

“Aww, it’s okay. I never expected anything different in the first place. Even for a diary,” Sora says, but his grin’s a mile wide. Riku shakes his head and directs his attention towards the console.

“It’s odd, actually,” the entity formerly known as Jiminy’s Journal says, summoning up a panel with one gloved hand and swiping through the files.“When it comes down to it, I’m still… him. Just with a whole new set of thoughts and abilities layered on top. We’re on totally separate paths now. You know, it’s funny, because—”

“I was never really good with computers,” Riku chimes in simultaneously. They both stop and turn to look at one another with a surprised laugh.

“I guess maybe not that different after all. Though we’re same at core, the Journal had one purpose—taking care of everything that happens to this guy.”

He points up directly at Sora, who points a finger back at himself like a question, mouth rounded into a little “ _o_.”

“So now it’s my lot in life,” the data Riku continues with a resigned sigh, but he smiles. “There are worse gigs.”

“…Ah,” sighs Riku, and softly adds, “I don’t know that we’re any different at all, if that’s the case.”

“I just do a little less of the dirty work now. Though I’m not the only other version. Think of each of us as… programs in development. You’ll always by default be the latest and greatest. But that doesn’t make any of the rest of us obsolete.”

Riku smiles, but it tapers off before it can reach his eyes now that the dread has started to concrete his insides. If this really were a carbon copy of his heart, then he’d better have a real good excuse, since he’s about to be the bearer of some pretty bad news. But he owes it to himself. Had it been the other way around, and the data Riku had to look him in the eyes and tell him that _his_ Sora had vanished right in front of him…

He breathes—deep enough, he hopes, that on the exhale he’ll loosen up his taught shoulder-blades and tighten up his tense nerves.

“I lost… I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

His data self looks at him severely and nods once, twice, then furrows his brow for a moment before conceding with a small smile.

“Stop with all the apologizing.” He shakes his head. “We should really get better about forgiving ourselves. Don’t you think?”

And how did he forget? Copy and copied alike stay steadfast and true, bound by common denominator. Asking forgiveness is redundant.

“Losing him can’t be _that_ easy; I’ve tried, but he can’t stay away even if it’s for his own good. But I’m not worried, because I believe in him. Same as I know that if you knew anything more, you wouldn’t be standing around talking to me about it.”

“So what do we do now?” Sora asks, pulling the both of them away from their staring contest. As they turn to look, Ansem also places himself back into the foreground.

“Now we must but wait and see.”

Where there was an entire adventure inside the console there is now only a grid—a blank slate—upon which Riku’s tiny avatar now stands alone, arms crossed. Around him settings appear for a brief visit, projected against the walls, half-formed landmarks cropping up in places that aren’t quite right. It’s the crumbling castle seated in the center of Radiant Garden, it’s the stark and austere walls of another in the City That Never Was, it’s the palm trees dotted with paopu that threaten to appear, then sink back into the simulation, all of it shrinking away from a render left incomplete by design.

The data Riku takes notice, looking up to see the data struggle to shift itself back into the correct angle, and when he realizes it’s not his doing but the codes themselves, he looks around with anxiety for something to help ground it.

“What if it doesn’t go back to being the same as it was?” Sora asks quietly of Ansem. “What’ll happen to them?”

“Naught that they should consider insurmountable, I’m certain.”

The grid calms but for a low rumble, where ripples suck at the void from top to bottom, and some earthquake force causes the ground to undulate beneath, or at least to appear so.

From out of their vantage comes a little cry, and the data Riku whirls around. Sora’s itty little dupe barrels directly into him with a bone crushing embrace. On impact the grid around reflects it, lighting up with an answering surge around them before sparkling out back into nothing. The data Riku laughs and hefts him up to spin him around, and they both giggle as they go, causing little pinpricks of light to shine down in rhythm.

With one more little laugh of exclamation, the data Sora pulls him down by the lapels of his coat to kiss him.

Something that’s not quite shock roots them in place on the solid ground of the physical world, though it doesn’t feel so real anymore—they watch the data Riku douse his Sora in affection with an aggressive hair ruffle and kisses peppered across his nose and cheeks.

“Data is entirely capable of being rendered a heart,” says Ansem. “It should be well familiar to you now that anything can grow one, given the right circumstances. Even the echo of light on its own resonates far enough to illuminate its surroundings.”

“A heart, yes,” Riku says, gaze fixed directly ahead without seeing. “But… that doesn’t answer why this is what they’ve chosen to do with it.”

“You are already aware that your counterparts are in effect the same as yourselves, and reflect many of the same qualities. Other than the plane in which they reside and the form they take to accommodate, there is little addition that would prove different. It appears that they stem from the same template of your devotion as well.”

Riku only looks ahead at that, nodding vaguely.

“Hey,” calls a voice from the console: the data Riku addresses them, an arm thrown lazily over Sora’s shoulder. “Thanks, everyone. We’ve got plenty to start clearing up around here, but we need one more favor. One of you needs to relay a message back to the system manually to tell them we’re operational.”

He produces a data disc from the air and waves it out in demonstration before pulling up another panel to run it through to them.

“We’d save you the trouble, but without knowing how far along the defrag is, this is about all we can do to avoid friendly fire from anything trying to attack the stuff that’s not cleaned up from the virus.”

“I’ll go,” Riku says automatically, breaking himself from his stupor to throw himself at the console. “I’ll be quick.”

“Hey—“ Sora starts, but Ansem puts a hand on his shoulder, and Riku and the data take off like a shot.

He materializes this time into a more familiar looking plane of cyberspace, complete with digital duds aglow. The layout of the space is straightforward, and he hauls directly to the transmitter and starts the process of activating processors and inputting commands.

He’s not surprised when a few minutes later another figure darkens the doorway to the I/O chamber.

“Didn’t trust me to do it on my own?” he says without diverting his attention, only catching him in the corner of his eye. Sora steps through, each footstep sounding a dulled metallic clang alongside the bright puddles of color that form beneath each stride.

“I didn’t trust you not to take off for a few months afterward just to avoid me.”

The I/O tower sparks to life, and Riku pulls a lever that throws it into gear with a crank and a hydraulic _whoosh_.

“That’s fair,” he says, dropping the data disc down onto the platform before stepping down from it. It’s surrounded by energy, and the platform is lit up in a column of green light as it starts the process of dematerializing the data back once more into bits and bytes. “And Ansem let you go?”

“‘ _Let’_ is a strong word. Maybe pick another one.” Sora brushes a finger under his nose before jogging up to stand beside him. “And, ‘sides. Couldn’t miss a chance to say ‘hey’ to Tron.”

He takes a stance with legs spread far apart and cups his hands at his mouth to full body bellow at the transmitter.

“ _Hey, Tron!_ ”

In a beat, the response comes in a flurry of colorful sparks sent up the pipeline. Sora laughs with delight, and Riku lets escape a smile, giving the platform one authoritative nod as if Tron could see his greeting too. The data disc disappears, and the lightshow fades with it, but in its place Tron has left something new—a new program code, encased in a small cube marked with circular patterns that light up across a spectrum of color. Riku steps forward on to the platform to collect it.

“So,” Sora says, arms firmly crossed, “do I have to give you a head start, or can I just go ahead and catch up to you now?”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he says, inspecting the cube for a moment before holding it out for him to see. When Sora steps up to join him and look for himself, he adds, “Just needed a minute to clear my head.”

“Oh, yeah?” Sora takes the cube and holds it aloft for a moment, peering at it below from every possible angle before tossing it up in the air and catching it again. Riku takes it from him and plays with it, threading it through all of his fingers back and forth in a continuous chain as he answers.

“Yeah. You see, I was scared. And let me finish,” he adds, predicting Sora’s response in the second before he opens his mouth. “Like I said. I needed a minute.

“I guess I was worried about making it strange. That if I asked you how you felt about me, you’d wonder if we followed their lead because we thought we should, not because we wanted to.

“But I’m not going to deny it. That’s definitely how I feel about you, plain and simple. But then I thought, _well_. If I’m ready to accept that smug jerk in the coat has all the same stuff I’m made out of, then I’ve gotta assume the same about you.”

Riku throws the cube up in the air and catches it inside his fist.

“I believe in you, too. And I know that you’re gonna follow your heart no matter what.”

He finally turns to look at him, seeing the dull glow of the chamber reflect back at him through his eyes, which already sparkle along with the rest of his brilliant expression.

“So did I guess right?” Riku asks with a soft smile, and Sora nods slowly.

“Yeah,” he says in a murmur. “Definitely, _definitely_ feel the same.”

When Riku reaches to take Sora’s face in his hands the cube falls out of his grip, and as they meet mouths and close eyes neither notices the piercing dots of color that paint the air around them from the projection it shoots up when it clatters to the floor.

**Author's Note:**

>  _"When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."_ [[x]](https://sherlock-holm.es/stories/pdf/a4/1-sided/bruc.pdf)
> 
> #sorikuweek2019 | Day 6: Parallels 
> 
> not gonna lie to you this is my favorite thing i've written in a hot minute, i've wanted to do something with databoys for for _ever_


End file.
